On 8 June 2023, the European Commission published a long-awaited proposal for the establishment of an interinstitutional ethics body, meant to restore the public’s faith in the European Union’s administration following the Qatargate corruption scandal. Alas, the Commission’s proposal outlines a body that lacks investigative and sanctioning powers, has minimal administrative capacity and for the most part relies on the institution’s own policing. Put simply, it falls short of the promises made by the Commission’s President in her 2019 political guidelines, and much shorter of what was expected as a remedy to the European Union’s recent ethics-related scandals. In this short piece, we reflect on the Commission’s proposal for an inter-institutional ethics body in light of the overall ethics framework in the Union and provide a brief analysis of the Commission’s missed opportunity and of what could have been.

2023 年 6 月 8 日，欧盟委员会公布了一项期待已久的建立机构间道德机构的提案，旨在在卡塔尔门腐败丑闻后恢复公众对欧盟政府的信心。遗憾的是，该委员会的提案概述了一个缺乏调查和制裁权力、行政能力极低且在很大程度上依赖该机构自身监管的机构。简而言之，它没有达到欧盟委员会主席在 2019 年政治指导方针中做出的承诺，也远没有达到人们对欧盟最近道德相关丑闻的补救措施的预期。在这篇短文中，我们根据欧盟的整体道德框架反思了委员会关于建立机构间道德机构的提议，并对委员会错失的机会以及本可以得到的机会进行了简要分析。